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The differences between sales engineers and application engineers can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 4-6 years to become both a sales engineer and an application engineer. Additionally, a sales engineer has an average salary of $93,727, which is higher than the $92,921 average annual salary of an application engineer.
The top three skills for a sales engineer include pre sales, customer service and sales process. The most important skills for an application engineer are technical support, java, and C++.
| Sales Engineer | Application Engineer | |
| Yearly salary | $93,727 | $92,921 |
| Hourly rate | $45.06 | $44.67 |
| Growth rate | 6% | 6% |
| Number of jobs | 132,324 | 111,338 |
| Job satisfaction | 5 | - |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 74% | Bachelor's Degree, 72% |
| Average age | 44 | 44 |
| Years of experience | 6 | 6 |
A sales engineer is responsible for assisting customers with their technical equipment and advanced scientific product needs. Sales engineers must have excellent knowledge of the scientific processes and component functions of the products they're selling to deliver presentations and orient the customers. Sales engineers' duties also include troubleshooting, identifying product defects, and upgrading systems for better optimization. They are also responsible for analyzing cost estimates documents, performing adjustments as needed, process payments, arranging deliveries, and settling customers' complaints by replacing damaged items or doing refunds.
An application engineer is responsible for creating and re-designing system applications based on clients' specifications and sales demands. Application engineers run diagnostic tests on software programs, identify areas of improvement, install necessary updates, upgrade optimization, revise system codes, and provide technical support for customers' needs. They also generate ideas and locate other business opportunities by analyzing current trends in the technology market that would help build revenues and increase profitability for the company. An application engineer must have a strong command of programming languages, software application processes, and general technology disciplines.
Sales engineers and application engineers have different pay scales, as shown below.
| Sales Engineer | Application Engineer | |
| Average salary | $93,727 | $92,921 |
| Salary range | Between $66,000 And $132,000 | Between $69,000 And $125,000 |
| Highest paying City | Washington, DC | Redwood City, CA |
| Highest paying state | Virginia | California |
| Best paying company | Meta | Morgan Lewis |
| Best paying industry | Technology | Technology |
There are a few differences between a sales engineer and an application engineer in terms of educational background:
| Sales Engineer | Application Engineer | |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 74% | Bachelor's Degree, 72% |
| Most common major | Business | Mechanical Engineering |
| Most common college | Northwestern University | Georgia Institute of Technology |
Here are the differences between sales engineers' and application engineers' demographics:
| Sales Engineer | Application Engineer | |
| Average age | 44 | 44 |
| Gender ratio | Male, 90.1% Female, 9.9% | Male, 87.4% Female, 12.6% |
| Race ratio | Black or African American, 1.7% Unknown, 6.2% Hispanic or Latino, 8.0% Asian, 7.1% White, 76.8% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.3% | Black or African American, 1.4% Unknown, 6.1% Hispanic or Latino, 6.7% Asian, 11.5% White, 74.0% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.3% |
| LGBT Percentage | 7% | 7% |